People who bought this also bought...

Pomfret Towers

Pomfret Towers, Barsetshire seat of the earls of Pomfret, was constructed, with great pomp and want of concern for creature comforts, in the once-fashionable style of Sir Gilbert Scott's St Pancras station. It makes a grand setting for a house party at which gamine Alice Barton and her brother, Guy, are honoured guests, mixing with the headstrong Rivers family, the tally-ho Wicklows, and, most charming of all, Giles Foster, nephew and heir of the present Lord Pomfret.

Summer Half

A captivating comic novel from Angela Thirkell's much-loved 1930s Barsetshire series: trainee barrister Colin Keith makes an ill-advised foray into teaching at Southbridge School. To his parents' dismay, Colin Keith - out of the noble but misplaced sense of duty peculiar to high-minded young university graduates - chooses to quit his training for the Bar and take a teaching job at Southbridge School.

High Rising: A Virago Modern Classic

Successful lady novelist Laura Morland and her boisterous young son, Tony, set off to spend Christmas at her country home in the sleepy surrounds of High Rising. But Laura's wealthy friend and neighbor, George Knox, has taken on a scheming secretary whose designs on marriage to her employer threaten the delicate social fabric of the village.

August Folly

In August Folly, the village of Worsted is staging Hippolytus. Inevitably, the most absurd romances bloom. Boorish young Richard Tebben, just down from Oxford, falls in love with Mrs. Dean, mother of nine, whose oldest son loves Richard's sister, who in turn loves another. And round and round it goes. Amidst a series of comic catastrophes, everyone manages to redeem themselves.

The Brandons

Like Barbara Pym, E.F. Benson, and, mother of them all, Jane Austen, Angela Thirkell has created a small world of her own in the English countryside. Calf-love, village affairs, and literary effort are her nominal subjects, while people at their imperfect best are her real subjects.

A Quiet Life in the Country: A Lady Hardcastle Mystery, Book 1

Lady Emily Hardcastle is an eccentric widow with a secret past. Florence Armstrong, her maid and confidante, is an expert in martial arts. The year is 1908 and they've just moved from London to the country, hoping for a quiet life. But it is not long before Lady Hardcastle is forced out of her self-imposed retirement. There's a dead body in the woods, and the police are on the wrong scent. Lady Hardcastle makes some enquiries of her own, and it seems she knows a surprising amount about crime investigation...

Before Lunch

Published in 1939, Before Lunch is a portrait of the charming English community of "Barsetshire." When the erection of a tea shop and garage threatens to spoil the bovine pastures of Pooker's Piece, Lady Bond and Lord Pomfret unite with the Middletons and the Stoners to stop it. In the meantime, the young and the not-so-young all fall in love - though not always with the right person - and sort out their affairs in a hilarious welter of cross-purposes.

Coronation Summer

This charming, witty historical novel is set in the summer of 1838, when the young Victoria, scarcely older than the tale's narrator Fanny Harcourt, assumes the throne of England. Happily, the festivities do little to distract Fanny and her close friend Emily from more familiar concerns: infatuations and romantic misunderstandings, the rigors of matchmaking and courtship, and the web of acquaintances that circumscribe any social scene.

In the Market for Murder: Lady Hardcastle, Book 2

Spring, 1909, and Lady Hardcastle, amateur sleuth and all-round eccentric, is enjoying a well-deserved rest. But a week after a trip to the cattle market, Spencer Caradine, a local farmer, turns up dead in the pub, face-down in his beef and mushroom pie. Once again, it is up to Lady Hardcastle and her maid, Florence, to solve the case.

Murder of a Lady

Duchlan Castle is a gloomy place in the Scottish Highlands. Late one night the body of Mary Gregor, sister of the laird, is found in the castle. She has been stabbed to death in her locked bedroom. The only tiny clue to the culprit is a silver fish's scale, left on the floor next to Mary's body. Inspector Dundas is dispatched to investigate. The Gregor family and their servants are quick to explain that Mary was a kind and charitable woman, but Dundas uncovers a more complex truth.

The Late Scholar: The Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet, Book 4

When a dispute among the fellows of St. Severin's College, Oxford University, reaches a stalemate, Lord Peter Wimsey discovers that as the Duke of Denver he is "the Visitor" - charged with the task of resolving the issue. It is time for Lord Peter and his detective novelist wife Harriet to revisit their beloved Oxford, where their long and literate courtship finally culminated in their engagement and marriage.

Excellent Women

Mildred Lathbury is a clergyman's daughter and a mild-mannered spinster in 1950s England. She is one of those excellent women - the smart, supportive, repressed women whom men take for granted. As Mildred gets embroiled in the lives of her new neighbors - anthropologist Helena Napier; Helen's handsome, dashing husband, Rocky; and Julian Malory, the vicar next door - the novel presents a series of snapshots of human life as actually, and pluckily, lived.

The Secrets of Wishtide

Mrs. Laetitia Rodd, aged 52, is the widow of an archdeacon who makes her living as a highly discreet private investigator. Her brother, Frederick Tyson, is a criminal barrister living in nearby Highgate with his wife and 10 children. Frederick finds the cases, and Laetitia solves them using her arch intelligence and her immaculate cover as an unsuspecting widow. When a case arises involving the son of the highly connected Sir James Calderstone, Laetitia sets off for Lincolnshire undercover as the family's new governess.

Surfeit of Lampreys

Ngaio Marsh’s most popular novel begins when a young New Zealander’s first contact with the English gentry is the body of Lord Wutherford - with a meat skewer through the eye.... The Lampreys had plenty of charm - but no cash. They all knew they were peculiar - and rather gloried in it. The double and triple charades, for instance, with which they would entertain their guests - like rich but awful Uncle Gabriel, who was always such a bore.

Charlotte Fairlie

Charlotte Fairlie is a successful, elegant career woman. Still in her 20s, she has landed a job as headmistress of her old school. She is admired and liked by both staff and pupils - but she begins to feel there is something missing in her well-organised life. Then one summer she goes to stay with a young pupil on the remote Scottish Isle of Targ. In the romantic atmosphere of the Highlands, anything can happen - and even the cool, efficient Charlotte surprises herself.

A Man of Some Repute: A Very English Mystery, Book 1

Selchester Castle in 1953 sits quiet and near-empty, its corridors echoing with glories of the past. Or so it seems to intelligence officer Hugo Hawksworth, wounded on a secret mission and now reluctantly assuming an altogether less perilous role at Selchester.

Wicked Autumn: A Max Tudor Novel

Max Tudor has adapted well to his post as vicar of St. Edwold's in the idyllic village of Nether Monkslip. The quiet village seems the perfect home for Max, who has fled a harrowing past as an MI5 agent. But this new-found serenity is quickly shattered when the highly vocal and unpopular president of the Women's Institute turns up dead at the Harvest Fayre. The death looks like an accident, but Max's training as a former agent kicks in, and before long he suspects foul play.

The Frozen Lake: A Vintage Mystery

Fabulous family saga of secrets held through two generations, set against the atmospheric background of the Lake District at Christmas. The year 1936 is drawing to a close. Winter grips Wetmoreland and causes a rare phenonmenon: The lakes freeze. For two local families, the Richardsons and the Grindleys, this will bring unexpected upheaval, as the frozen lake entices long-estranged siblings and children to return home for the holiday season.

Miss Bun, the Baker's Daughter

D. E. Stevenson's fine sense of characterisation and romance makes this novel a delight to read. It is a golden tale of ordinary, lovable people in a small town of Beilford. Sue, the Baker's daughter, makes an uncharacteristically impulsive decision to accept a post as housekeeper to Mr and Mrs Darnay, dashing her family's hopes of her marrying a local suitor. And when Mrs Darnay suddenly departs, Sue's position in the house is left open to idle gossip.

Strong Poison: A Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane Mystery

Dashing detective Lord Peter Wimsey is caught up in the murder trial of mystery writer Harriet Vane. Her fiance has died of poisoning exactly as described in one of Harriet's novels, so naturally she is the prime suspect. As Peter looks on, he not only falls in love with the accused but eagerly helps with Harriet's defense when the first trial ends in a hung jury. Will she be convicted and executed for the crime, or can he save her life and win her hand in marriage?

The Santa Klaus Murder

Aunt Mildred declared that no good could come of the Melbury family Christmas gatherings. So when Sir Osmond Melbury, the family patriarch, is discovered - by a guest dressed as Santa Klaus - with a bullet in his head on Christmas Day, the festivities are plunged into chaos. Nearly everybody stands to reap some sort of benefit from his death excepting Santa Klaus, the one person who seems to have had every opportunity to fire the shot.

Crowned and Dangerous

Nothing is simple when you're 35th in line for the British crown, least of all marriage. But with love on their side and plans to elope, Lady Georgiana Rannoch and her beau, Darcy O'Mara, hope to bypass a few royal rules....

Miss Buncle's Book

The scene of this entertaining story is laid in a charming English village. The plot centres round Miss Barbara Buncle, a maiden lady who was obliged to write a book because – as she naively explained – her dividends were so poor. Unfortunately, Miss Buncle had no imagination, so she wrote about her friends – quite kindly and truthfully, of course, for she was a benevolent and veracious soul.

The Lark Shall Sing

There was no money, the family was scattered, and Lucille, who had mothered them all since she was 16, was going to be married. So the house must be sold; Lucille knew that was the only sensible things to do, but the family had other ideas. Home they came by whatever way they could, penniless and bedraggled but with certain newfound friends who were to help them to upset Lucille's plans - all her plans for a calm, settled, and sensible life.

Publisher's Summary

Pretty, impecunious Mary Preston, newly arrived as a guest of her aunt Agnes at the magnificent wooded estate of Rushwater, falls head over heels for handsome playboy David Leslie. Meanwhile Agnes and her mother, the eccentric matriarch Lady Emily, have hopes of a different, more suitable match for Mary. At the lavish Rushwater dance party, her future happiness hangs in the balance....

I cannot say enough good things about this novel and do not know what was in the head of the person who gave it a bad review. This is, so far, my favorite Thirkell novel, and that is saying something. Characters that leap out from the page and into your heart. Austenesque misadventures in love. And wickedly funny humor. I almost never laugh out loud at a book, but I must have laughed several hundred times at this one. Absolutely marvelous!

I'm a mom. I have drama in my life. I don't want books with the F-bomb, nor graphic violence. I read for fun and to bring my family together. I read for reducing stress levels. We have never had a television in our home and our children are now mid twenties to 19. We listen together and look for belly-wrenching laughter. So what is it like to live without a TV? Awesomely educational and inspirational. Each new book is a marvel.

Books written in the 1930s have a similar flare and this one certainty did not disappoint the romantic. Somewhat slow and sometimes silly, the crushes and loves that progress throughout the summer are beautifully described. This is an honorable romance because everyone keeps their pants up and zippers zipped.

Much ado about nothing. . . . but not as pleasant as her usual fluff. Too much time spent in the brains of people getting worked up about foolish things. Good but not stellar performance, and a weaker-than-normal-story.

I am thrilled that Angela Thirkell's books are finally being released on audio, and that they started with this one (my absolute favourite). Hilary Neville does a really perfect job of narrating, and I can't fault it. I hope she does the next one, and not Yonnie Fraser who was used for Pomfret Towers (dreadful).

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

Katharine

United Kingdom

11/15/16

Overall

Performance

Story

"Delicious social comedy"

This grew on me as I listened to it. There is no real plot to speak of but the social comedy is delicious as the author shows up the foibles and foolishness of her characters from the very camp social climbing gardening expert to the beautiful woman entirely obsessed by her children. There is also a rather touching romance, undertones of sadness as parents remember their eldest son killed in World War I, and some teenage French Royalists. I went from slightly underwhelmed to entirely charmed in the course of listening, helped by the really excellent narration.

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Report Inappropriate Content

If you find this review inappropriate and think it should be removed from our site, let us know. This report will be reviewed by Audible and we will take appropriate action.